The motive force of history is truth and not lies.
LEON TROTSKYOld age is the most unexpected of all things that happen to a man.
More Leon Trotsky Quotes
-
-
If one cannot get along without a mirror, even in shaving oneself, how can one reconstruct oneself or one’s life, without seeing oneself in the “mirror” of literature?
LEON TROTSKY -
Dialectical thought is related to vulgar thinking in the same way that a motion picture is related to a still photograph. The motion picture does not outlaw the still photograph but combines a series of them according to the laws of motion.
LEON TROTSKY -
A means can be justified only by its end. But the end in its turn needs to be justified.
LEON TROTSKY -
The people will have the right to elect their representatives from a list of candidates [who have been approved by the Party].
LEON TROTSKY -
Revolutionary realism tries to draw the maximum advantage from every situation – that is what makes it revolutionary – but at the same time it does not permit us to set ourselves fantastic aims – that is what makes it realistic.
LEON TROTSKY -
With all due respect to all philistines, the dictatorship of the proletariat does just consist in “giving a hiding” to the classes that were previously supreme, before forcing them to recognize the new order and to submit to it.
LEON TROTSKY -
Ideas that enter the mind under fire remain there securely and for ever.
LEON TROTSKY -
Learning carries within itself certain dangers because out of necessity one has to learn from one’s enemies.
LEON TROTSKY -
The Soviet Union needs thinking and critical friends, such as are capable not only of singing hymns in the hours of success, but of not shrinking in the hour of defeat and danger.
LEON TROTSKY -
If you cannot convince a Fascist, acquaint his head with the pavement.
LEON TROTSKY -
Let us not forget that revolutions are accomplished through people, although they be nameless. Materialism does not ignore the feeling, thinking, and acting man, but explains him.
LEON TROTSKY -
Fascism is a caricature of Jacobinism.
LEON TROTSKY -
In 1917 there was not a single Bolshevik who considered possible the realization of a socialist society in a single country, and least of all in Russia.
LEON TROTSKY -
In the appendix to my History of the Russian Revolution I give a detailed and documented study of the ideas of the Bolshevik party on the October revolution. This study, I hope, will make it impossible in the future to ascribe to [Vladimir] Lenin the theory of Socialism in a single country.
LEON TROTSKY -
Where force is necessary, there it must be applied boldly, decisively and completely.
LEON TROTSKY -
One of the most surprising things in life is the sudden realization that one has become old.
LEON TROTSKY -
The dictatorship of the Communist Party is maintained by recourse to every form of violence.
LEON TROTSKY -
Everyone has a right to be stupid, but Comrade MacDonald abuses the privilege.
LEON TROTSKY -
To overthrow the power of the bourgeoisie and to establish the power of the proletariat in one country still does not signify the full victory of Socialism.
LEON TROTSKY -
The history of a revolution is for us first of all a history of the forcible entrance of the masses into the realm of rulership over their own destiny.
LEON TROTSKY -
Without a correct strategy the victory is impossible. But even the most correct strategy cannot give the victory under unfavorable objective conditions.
LEON TROTSKY -
England is nothing but the last ward of the European madhouse, and quite possibly it will prove to be the ward for particularly violent cases.
LEON TROTSKY -
You are pitiful isolated individuals; you are bankrupts; your role is played out. Go where you belong from now on – into the dustbin of history!
LEON TROTSKY -
The historic ascent of humanity, taken as a whole, may be summarized as a succession of victories of consciousness over blind forces – in nature, in society, in man himself.
LEON TROTSKY -
Communism needs democracy like the human body needs oxygen.
LEON TROTSKY -
The revolution has its own laws: in the period of its culmination it pushes the most highly developed, determined and far-seeing stratum of the revolutionary class to the most advanced positions.
LEON TROTSKY